The
area of Baytown began to be settled as early as 1822. One of its
earliest residents was Nathaniel Lynch, who set up a ferry crossing
at the junction of the San Jacinto River and Buffalo Bayou. The
ferry service that he started is still in operation today, now
known as the Lynchburg Ferry. Other early residents of Baytown
include William Scott, one of Stephen F. Austin's Old Three
Hundred, and Ashbel Smith, who owned a plantation in the area. The
city now known as Baytown was originally three separate towns. The
first of these was Goose Creek, named for the bayou of the same
name where Canadian Geese wintered and whose name is still
reflected in the area's Goose Creek CISD, whose establishment dates
back to before 1850. With the discovery of the Goose Creek Oil
Field, the rival communities of Pelly in the late 1910s, and East
Baytown in the early 1920s, developed as early boomtowns. The
"East" in East Baytown was later dropped because it was west of
Goose Creek. Serious talk of merging the three cities began shortly
after World War I, but the community of Baytown was opposed to this
idea. However, in 1947, the three cities finally agreed to
consolidate. The citizens settled on the name Baytown for the new
combined city. Baytown as it is known today was officially founded
January 24, 1948. In 1916, the Humble Oil & Refining Company,
founded by one-time Texas governor Ross S. Sterling and his
associates, in developing the Goose Creek Oil Field, built the
first offshore drilling operation in Texas and the second in the
United States. The company later built the Baytown Refinery, which
would become one of the largest Exxon Refineries in the world.
Since then, many other refineries have been built in the area.
Exxon-Mobil is still one of the major employers in the city and now
runs over ten plants in the area. Steel manufacturing in Baytown
began in 1970 when United States Steel opened the Texas Works near
the city. The 48 inch seamless pipe used in the Trans-Alaska
Pipeline System was produced at the facility's pipe mill. The plant
was officially closed in July 1986 (never reopening after a
nationwide strike against the company), due to a poor economic
climate and the decline of American steel in the 1980s.
Congrats to Nebulus703 for
FTF!
Please
remember the golden rule of geocaching - if you take something,
leave something of equal or greater
value.
*Original contents - pencil
and log only